Month: April 2007

Some environmentalists are calling for a moratorium on foreign ships entering the Great Lakes. Foreign ships are believed to be responsible for many of the invasive species causing billions of dollars of damage to the Great Lakes economy and ecosystems. (Photo by Lester Graham)

Transcript

Environmentalists are trying to ratchet up pressure on the shipping
industry over invasive species. They’re calling for a moratorium on
allowing ocean-going ships into the Great Lakes. David Sommerstein
reports:

Foreign freighters account for about 25% of overall tonnage on the
Great Lakes.

Jennifer Caddick says those ships’ ballast water bring a new invasive
species into the region, on average, every six months. Caddick’s
group, Save The River, has joined Great Lakes United in a petition
campaign for a moratorium:

“There is continuous talk, you know over the past 10 or 15 years, about having new, stronger ballast regulations
to stem the flow of invasive species, and unfortunately, nothing has
happened. Frankly, we have said enough is enough.”

Caddick admits a moratorium is unlikely. The agency that runs the
shipping lanes says it would violate a 1909 treaty with Canada.

Invasive species do billions of dollars of damage in the Great Lakes.
There are five bills in Congress to address the problem, but none has made
it out of committee.

Transcript

Foresters are worried about a wasp that’s killing pine trees. The insect is
spreading through pine forests in northern states. Steve Carmody reports:

The female Sirex woodwasp injects a combination of a toxic mucus and a
fungus while laying her eggs in pine trees. The mixture feeds the eggs, but
kills tree cells, often further weakening stressed pines.

In the three years since it first appeared in upstate New York, the Sirex
woodwasp has spread to 25 New York counties, and two counties in
Pennsylvania and part of Ontario.

Bob Heyd, with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, says the Sirex
woodwasp is spreading:

“The wasp is actually very strong fliers. They can fly 70 or 100 miles, so what it
is here… it will disperse very quickly.”

In other countries, forestry officials have found an imported predatory
nematode from the wasp’s home range in Europe has been an effective
biological control. It’s unclear if officials in the US will try the same
tactic.

For the Environment Report, I’m Steve Carmody.

Related Links

The government is studying ways to reduce water pollution from
spreading manure on farm fields. Lester Graham reports some experts
believe the way many farmers spread manure is more likely to pollute
lakes and streams:

Transcript

The government is studying ways to reduce water pollution from
spreading manure on farm fields. Lester Graham reports some experts
believe the way many farmers spread manure is more likely to pollute
lakes and streams:

A lot of times, farmers don’t spread manure for fertilizer in the spring because
it can get in the way of opportunities to plant. So, a lot of farmers
spread manure in the winter. But spreading liquid manure on the frozen
ground means it doesn’t get plowed into the soil. Snow and rain can
wash the manure over the frozen dirt and into waterways.

Steve Jann is involved in a study by the Environmental Protection
Agency and the U.S. Department of Ag:

“When that runoff occurs it can carry manure pollutants with it. And
those pollutants when they enter surface waters can kill fish or allow
pathogens to enter surface water.”

And if that river or lake supplies drinking water, it can make people
sick. The study will compare pollution levels in waterways from
manure-spreading in the winter and the spring to see if pollution
from farm fields can be reduced.

For the Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

The Army is beginning the final phase to destroy a deadly chemical
weapon that’s been stored in Newport, Indiana since the 1960s. The
Army says the chemical weapon “VX” has been neutralized. Now the army
is shipping wastewater from the neutralization process to an
incinerator in Texas. Jim Meadows reports that some critics say the
wastewater is not safe for transport:

Transcript

The Army is beginning the final phase to destroy a deadly chemical
weapon that’s been stored in Newport, Indiana since the 1960s. The
Army says the chemical weapon “VX” has been neutralized. Now the army
is shipping wastewater from the neutralization process to an
incinerator in Texas. Jim Meadows reports that some critics say the
wastewater is not safe for transport:

Mitch Williams is with the Chemical Weapons Working Group. He says
civilian workers at the Newport, Indiana facility say VX and a by-
product, Experimental Agent 2192, have been re-forming in the
wastewater.

Williams says an accident during transport or incineration could poison
people. Army Colonel Jesse Barber oversees the VX destruction
process. He says the wastewater is free of VX and its by-products:

“I know number one, we don’t have detectable agent and number two, we don’t have
detectable EA 2192. Before I take it out of the reactor, I ensure we make our clearance criteria.”

The Army plans to have all the VX destroyed by next year. The Chemical
Weapons Working Group is going to court to try to stop the process.

For the Environment Report, I’m Jim Meadows.

Related Links

Today we’re presenting the first in an
occasional series about peoples’ connections to
the environment. Producer Kyle Norris asked a
range of people if they felt close to nature.
She begins by talking with her uncle, a professional
fly-fisherman:

Transcript

Today we’re presenting the first in an
occasional series about peoples’ connections to
the environment. Producer Kyle Norris asked a
range of people if they felt close to nature.
She begins by talking with her uncle, a professional
fly-fisherman:

My Uncle Mark has run a fishing guide service for twenty-nine years. He
floats down the Potomac River in a 14-foot aluminum raft that he
designed. He goes through Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia, where the
Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers come together near the Blue Ridge
Mountains. My uncle says that for him, the thrill of fishing dates back
to his childhood in Michigan:

“You know, when I first started, it was like I’m going to catch fish
and as a little kid I liked to ride back home from the Detroit River
with a stringer across the handlebars of my bicycle, I was the great
hunter or great fisherman. And we took turns as buddies bringing fish
home on their bikes.”

I don’t get to see my uncle a whole lot. But when I was little, he took
my cousin and me fishing. He made us kiss the first fish that we
caught. Which was kind of silly and fun.

“Oh, you always kiss your first fish. Twenty-five years ago I had some
younger anglers in my boat. And one of them caught a fish and he gave it
a kiss and let it go and I looked at him and then I caught a fish I
think a little bit later and I didn’t kiss it and he goes, ‘What are
you doing?’ and I said, ‘Well, what do you mean?’ And he goes, ‘Oh, you
have to kiss your first fish.’ And I just said, ‘Well, that makes a lot
of sense.’ I think it sets the tone for the day.”

When you hold a fish up to your face and look closely at its glistening
scales and you kiss it, you definitely feel close to it.

“I fish a lot and I hardly ever kill any fish anymore. And in fishing
it’s really the most genteel of the blood sports. You know, you have all
the pleasures of the hunt but you don’t have to make the kill.”

When my uncle talks about nature, he gets this blissed-out look on his
face.

“The water colors can vary from, you know, coffee with cream if it’s
really been a lot of rain and it’s all stirred up to where it’s a
relative clear nice green to it. It can sometimes look like a trout
stream where it’s like gin-clear, you know. It depends on rainfall and the
time of year and stuff. And I love flowing water. ‘Cause it’s always
changing and it’s moving you. Especially when you wade in it. It runs
between your legs and it’s just, you feel like you’re a part of it.”

Some people talk about nature in spiritual terms. That’s something I
never talked about with my uncle but I wondered.

“Oh, it’s probably as spiritual as I get. Yeah, I think sometimes,
sure. You get a lot of respect for nature. And I guess um, spiritual quality…um, yeah. When you really try
to embrace the whole environment and you’re taking in all the flora and
fauna, you’re taking in all the trees and the aquatic vegetation and the
insects that live in that environment and then all the, all the
creatures that live in the environment, plus the fish I might be
pursuing and stuff and then how all that works together. And then how people impact that
too, and I always feel like, I never feel like I’m in control. I always feel like there’s a lot of
variables. I have an idea of what I’m doing but I never feel that I am
like I’m in control. And so I guess there’s a spiritual quality to
that. Got a lot of respect for nature. Got a lot of respect for water.
Flowing water especially.”

The way my uncle talks about the water and the words he uses really
paints a vivid picture in my head. I can hear the love in his voice.
When he talks like that, I feel closer to the places and the fish he’s
talking about. And hearing how he really feels makes me feel closer to
him.

Transcript

The government wants 20% of the
energy generated in the nation from renewable
resources. Today, we’re at a mere fraction of
that goal. Lisa Ann Pinkerton reports experts
believe the US could get there sooner if wind power
technology can be moved successfully to where the
electricity is actually consumed, America’s
cities:

Right next to Lake Erie, a large wind turbine spins hypnotically in the
breeze. Its three big propeller blades provide only around 6% of
the energy consumed at the museum where it’s located, the Great Lake
Science Center. So the big turbine is mainly for educational purposes.
The museum’s Executive Director, Linda Abraham Silver says turbine
catches the steady winds off the lake:

“We don’t want turbulence, that’s right. Steady wind is what produces
the best energy and saves the gears and instrumentation inside.”

The single wind turbine stands in a wide open space near Lake Erie, but here
on the streets of downtown Cleveland, the wind is blustery and
unpredictable. These conditions are hostile to traditional turbines.
So the conventional wisdom was wind power couldn’t flourish in urban
environments… that is, until now.

“I think the problem was the propeller, not the whole idea that wind
power was somehow unable to be captured in the city. Some people even tell
you there is no wind power in the city”

Bill Becker is an urban wind developer from Chicago. He’s abandoned the three-propeller design for a horizontal one.
And it kind of looks like a metal DNA double-helix strand. He says it’s
actually two turbine designs in one so the machine can function in low and high winds. The turbine, manufactured
by Aerotecture, is a lot smaller than traditional ones so it can be mounted on rooftops. Becker’s installed 16 on skyscrapers in
Boston and Chicago. They can generate enough electricity to power two homes annually in a typical breezy day.

Becker’s not the only inventor who thinks there are better alternatives
to expansive turbine wind farms sprouting up on ridges and bluffs
across the country. And in England, the three-blade concept isn’t dead
yet.

The company Quiet Revolution has a vertical turbine with blades curving
up and down it. It creates power in even the slightest breeze, but that
power isn’t any more than Becker’s model and it costs 4 times as much.

Instead of catching open wind, in California entrepreneurs are
capturing a very specific type of wind: breezes traveling up and over
building parapets. Those are walls that extend past the roof lines of
big box retailers and factories:

“There’s a potentially great wind resource on those buildings that’s
not being tapped into today.”

Spokesman Steve Gitlin says the company AeroVironment is tapping into
this wind with systems of 15 turbines each. These futuristic rotating
fans, each about six feet tall, line the parapets of flat-roofed
buildings:

“What we’ve done is figured out there’s a unique acceleration of wind over that edge of the building
so the turbine’s designed to actually extend above and angle slightly downward
over that acceleration zone.”

The AeroVironment system is the most expensive… six times as much as the Aerotecture double-helix
design and generates slightly more electricity. It does, however, operate in very low wind, five miles per hour or less.

Ken Silverstein says this range in cost and efficiency shows the urban wind industry is
still growing. He edits Energy Biz magazine, and
adds to make an impact on the market, these turbine costs must come
down. And the government could help jumpstart the industry:

“It needs to develop, it needs to reach economies of scale so that the
technology improves, so that the costs come down and so that wind becomes more widespread than it is today.”

But Silverstein says, urban wind designs like these offers the hope
that businesses and even homeowners could capture the energy of the wind
directly on their own.

Transcript

Reports of contaminated pet foods,
causing illness and even death, have pet owners
scurrying for safe alternatives to feed their
animals. Joyce Kryszak reports that’s opening
a door of opportunity for advocates of holistic
pet feeding:

“This is Woody.”

You’d never guess that Woody is 11 to look at her. The mid-sized
mixed breed is as spry as a puppy. And as hungry as one, too, since we
rudely showed up at her dinner time. But Woody’s owner, Alexandra
Murphy says this is a good time to get a peek at Woody’s menu.

“Today, for breakfast she got two chicken wings, and she got a couple
of chicken gizzards. She’s going to have that for dinner and before she goes to bed tonight she’s going to have two
to three ounces of ground up veggies.”

Murphy says she’s a “raw feeder.” That means her dog Woody and 11-year-old cat, TJ, only eat raw meat and veggies. No kibble food from a
bag for these guys:

“Okay, I start with vegetables that I like. I like broccoli a lot because
nutritionally, it’s a very dense food.”

Murphy says she began feeding raw about seven
years ago after a doing a lot of research. And after getting a lot of
flack from fellow pet owners and skeptical veterinarians:

“I’m looking to give them something that is as close to what their species would get in nature.
I know my dog’s not a wolf. But I also know that pet food has only been made for the last fifty years. They
didn’t go through such a drastic change, that all of a sudden all of
this real food is going to make them sick.”

(Sound of prepping food and Murphy explaining)

Murphy is certainly not alone in her passion for holistic feeding.
There’s almost a cult following of pet owners who spend hours grinding
or cooking their own pet food. And there are some vets out there who
whole-heartily support them.

Cynthia Lankenau is a holistic veterinarian. Lankenau says commercial
foods have never been good for pets – even before the tainted food
scare. She says dogs and cats simply can’t digest grain very well.
But grain is the main ingredient in most commercial pet foods. So, why
do most vets still promote them? For starters, Lankenau says it was a
major pet food-maker that taught nutrition at her vet school:

“Yeah, just about any vet that graduates is truly, honestly, strongly
believing that that’s the best nutrition that’s available. But we were
brainwashed.”

But some vets are breaking free of traditional training. Jim Albert is
a small animal veterinarian and a vet for the Buffalo, New York zoo.
Albert’s still not sure how he feels about raw meat diets for pets. But
Albert admits that the nutritional requirements are quite similar, no
matter the size of the canine or the cat.

“Small animals have small canine teeth for a reason, dogs and
cats. And those were typically used to apprehend and hold prey, so I
guess you could make the argument that meat should certainly constitute
a percentage of their diet.”

Albert concedes there are plenty of good options out there. And
there’s good reason for people to be exploring those options. Albert
says he’s treated half a dozen pets that became very sick from tainted
commercial foods. And he says that has even some of his busiest
clients are trading in their processed food and making their own in
food processors.

“It certainly wasn’t feasible for a lot of our clients in the past, but
I think they’re taking these kind of matters into their own hands.”

Back in Alexandra Murphy’s kitchen it’s pretty obvious how much work
homemade pet food can be. Murphy says her pets are worth it. But she
admits making homemade pet food isn’t for everyone:

“Although I love doing this, I would say to someone, if you’re the
kind of person who says, ‘Oh, I really don’t want to have to do this,
can I cut this corner, can I cut that corner,’ you may not be cut out
for it. Because if you can’t do it right, you shouldn’t be doing it at
all.”

She says one of the best ways to find out is to find a good mentor.
And they are out there. You can find them by calling a local holistic
vet. Or, go online and you’ll find packs of natural feeders who love
to share their philosophies… and their recipes.

Transcript

Wildlife groups have gone to court, seeking to reverse a recent federal
decision that took the grey wolf off the list of protected
species. Chuck Quirmbach reports:

The Fish and Wildlife Service ruled in February that the wolf
population was strong enough in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan that
the wolves no longer had to be listed as endangered or threatened. The
states can euthanize problem wolves or even develop a wolf hunt.

But three groups have just filed a lawsuit over the federal action.
Rebecca Judd is an attorney with the Humane Society of the United
States. she says the door has been opened to large attacks on the wolf
population.

“We don’t think that the wolf’s recent progress toward recovery should now
be squandered by exposing them to killings and state-authorized hunting
and trapping programs.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service says the states in the western Great
Lakes region have good plans for protecting the grey wolf, but the
federal agency is preparing a five year monitoring effort.

For the Environment Report, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

Related Links

New research out of Stanford University says ethanol-based fuels might
not be any better for the environment than gasoline. But as Dustin
Dwyer reports, that’s not expected to stop the drive to increase
ethanol use:

Transcript

New research out of Stanford University says ethanol-based fuels might
not be any better for the environment than gasoline. But as Dustin
Dwyer reports, that’s not expected to stop the drive to increase
ethanol use:

Researchers at Stanford University found that even while ethanol based
E85 fuel can reduce some harmful vehicle emissions, it increases
others.

The study shows that E85 can lead to higher ozone emissions, which
contribute to smog. And the study says that could cause up to 185 more
ozone-related deaths in the U.S. every year.

This isn’t the first study showing the possible hazards of ethanol.
Others have raised concerns about the impact corn-based ethanol could
have on the food supply, and how it could affect land use, but ethanol
supporters say it’s still the best available option to cut down on
foreign oil.

Ethanol remains politically popular, and Detroit automakers have
committed to making up to half of their annual vehicle fleets ethanol-
capable by 2012.

Transcript

Scientists are scrambling to find out why honey bee populations are
collapsing. Lester Graham reports, there are a lot of theories. Some
of them are getting more attention than others:

Recently, beekeepers have seen entire colonies of worker bees leave and
never come back to the hive. It’s called Colony Collapse Disorder.
Some news reports have suggested wireless phones or cell phone towers
might be throwing off bees’ navigation.

Barry O’Connor is Curator of Insects at the University of Michigan’s
Museum of Zoology. He says so far, that’s just a theory:

“This phenomenon has been seen in a lot of places where there aren’t
cell phone towers. And so it’s not the whole story if it’s even a part
of the story.”

Other theories for the collapse include stress from moving bees around
to pollinate crops, a newer class of nicotine-based pesticides, a
genetically modified corn with a built-in insecticide, or a combination
of environmental problems.

Growers say food production could drop a lot without honeybees to
pollinate crops.